


Tua Aeternum

by Immortalgothgirl



Category: Carmen Sandiego (Cartoon 2019)
Genre: Angst, Blood and Violence, F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Love Confessions, Mutual Pining, Past Relationship(s), Religious Content, wlw
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-22
Updated: 2021-01-22
Packaged: 2021-03-14 12:21:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 901
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28920480
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Immortalgothgirl/pseuds/Immortalgothgirl
Relationships: Carmen Sandiego | Black Sheep/Tigress | Sheena
Comments: 2
Kudos: 20





	Tua Aeternum

Sheena should have figured _her_ of all fucking people would show up. A caper of this magnitude was far too enticing for Fedora the Explorer to let slip through her fingertips.  
Her gaze is filled with a fire only she can seem to master and _really_ mean it. Still, Sheena loathed the way her limbs turned to lead at the sight of her, abhorred the way her brain screamed to lunge at her with all the force and fury of her namesake, only for the sound of her thudding heart to block it out.

"You need to leave." Sheena hissed, _"Please."_

Carmen did not move a muscle, "You know I can't do that."

"Well you've had no trouble leaving before have you?!" Sheena snapped, the crack in her voice was embarrassing, _it's over_ , she told herself, _it's in the past._ "Never had any trouble walking away from the people who-"

She thanked whatever God was listening that she cut herself off when she did. 

"Sheena, I'm sorry. I had to leave. You know that." Carmen took a pensive step towards her, "It's been hard for me too, you know. I miss you."

And there it was, in an instant the walls she had so carefully spent the better half of a year building around her heart had crumbled, and she was suffocating under the debris.   
Carmen took another step, and suddenly Sheena forgets everything she knows about being a V.I.L.E operative, about being _Tigress_. "No, you don't get to do this to me Carmen. Not again."

"I never wanted to leave you." If the cave they found themselves in wasn't so dimly lit, Sheena would swear on her life that Carmen's eyes glittered with unshed tears, or maybe they were her own, she wonders. 

They couldn't stand here forever, Paper Star was near, and Christ knows neither Sheena or Carmen would be able to explain why they weren't in a fight-to-the-death brawl. She didn't notice, but Carmen- paragon of stealth that she was- was now close enough to take Sheena's gloved hand, claws and all.

"You need to know-" Carmen rasped, swallowing the lump in her throat, desperately trying to steady her voice, "You need to know that even though I left you. You never left me. You were always in here." She pointed to her head, delicately probing her right temple, but then she lowered her hand and placed it over her chest, "And you were always in here."

Sheena has to turn away before she breaks. She feels Carmen's hand slacken around her own and she reaches a hand down her jumpsuit to clutch a pendant hanging from her chest, a buried memory, and, to Sheena, more precious than anything she could ever steal, for it was a treasure of the heart, and nothing of monetary significance. 

"Oh my God." Carmen's eyes bulged, "You still wear that?"

"I never take it off. You thought I was sleeping but I remember everything, when you gave it to me in the infirmary after I got hurt...and you kissed me."  
Carmen thinks she's never remembered anything more clearly. A caper gone wrong, Sheena's blood drenched jumpsuit, the metal pole tearing through the flesh of her abdomen, Carmen swore she heard a scream, and it wasn't until Le Chevre had sat her down outside Sheena's room that she discovered those sounds belonged to her. 

_"If there really is a God up there, then I know he won't take you away from me." Through the tears and the agonizing tremble in her voice is was a miracle she could string a sentence together, "This'll keep you safe, Tigress. Sheena." She wrapped the chain around Sheena's knuckles, and placed a soft kiss to her lips as the Crucifix dangled off the back of her hand._

A blush clouded Carmen's tan cheeks, so much so that it became increasingly difficult to decipher where her coat started and where the blush ended. "I thought you were going to die. We all did."

"The almighty power of God." Sheena retorts, mockingly flicking her fingers this way and that to form the sign of the Cross. Despite herself, Carmen chuckles.

"The power of Carmen Sandiego." She flashes Sheena a smile, a genuine smile, and Carmen hopes it conveys all the things she's trying to say.

_I'm sorry_   
_I miss you_   
_I love you_

Apparently, it did, because suddenly Sheena's hand was on her cheek, and in that very same second, their lips met. It was a kiss laden with a myriad of buried emotions, of hurt, regret, desire, love. 

One thing was clear, it was not a kiss goodbye. Never again.

"I love you Carmen, I always have."  
"I love you too."

Sheena had let her pass without protest. Right into the belly of the beast, no one would ever know, she would never tell anybody, that wasn't to say they didn't know how she felt. God knows she wears her emotions, plain as day. They all knew where her heart truly lay. 

Her perfume still lingered in the air when Paper Star eventually graced Sheena with her presence.   
"Didn't have you down as religious, Tigress." She cocked her head, peering at the Crucifix hanging from her neck.

"I'm not." She scowled, but all the same she clutched it, stared at it fondly, "But it means everything to me." 

_You mean everything to me, Carmen._


End file.
